


till the sun comes up

by rocketshiptospace



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 05:32:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7702576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rocketshiptospace/pseuds/rocketshiptospace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Simon takes a deep breath. “71.”</p>
<p>Clary gapes at him. “<i>71</i>?”</p>
<p>“Yes,” Simon snaps, “Yes, Clary, my number is 71. It’s right there,” he waves her wrist around, a little too aggressively, so it’s actually impossible to read. “The seven and the one. 71. My soulmate’s going to be 71 when we meet.”</p>
<p>Or, everyone has a number on their wrist that indicates how old their soulmate will be when they meet. Simon is trying to deal with the fact that his is abnormally high. It turns out not to be such a bad thing, after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	till the sun comes up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [finkpishnets](https://archiveofourown.org/users/finkpishnets/gifts).



> this is written for the lovely madroxed, as part of the sh summertime fest :) they said they like saphael, malec, clizzy and soulmate au's so i just decided to combine all of that in one fic lmao. i hope you like it!!!

“The universe hates me,” Simon declares, as Clary climbs into his obnoxiously yellow van. Well, Clary thinks it’s obnoxiously yellow. Simon prefers ‘actual drivable ray of sunshine’. It’s a continuous point of discussion between the two of them.

“I’m pretty sure the universe doesn’t give a rat’s ass about you,” Clary tells him consolingly, clicking the seat belt shut. “It has bigger things to worry about. Like global warming and the Taylor Swift/Kim Kardashian feud.”

Simon glares at her, “Thanks, that _definitely_ makes me feel better.” He pulls away from the curb and starts driving, intently staring at the road when he adds, “I got my soulmate tattoo this morning.”

Clary gasps and punches him in the arm, “You asshole! You should have lead with that! That’s like, a _big thing_!” She pauses, and when he continues to stubbornly stare out of the window, she punches him in the shoulder again. “Well? What is it! Come on, tell me what your number is!”

“You know what my number is,” Simon says, purposely avoiding the subject. “I’m pretty sure it’s the first number that ever got programmed into your phone. Years ago.” Clary simply glares at him. “ _Fine_ ,” he says, taking a deep breath. “71.”

Clary gapes at him. “ _71_?”

“Yes,” Simon snaps, “Yes, Clary, my number is 71. It’s right there,” he waves her wrist around, a little too aggressively, so it’s actually impossible to read. “The seven and the one. 71. My soulmate’s going to be 71 when we meet.”

“Oh,” Clary says, rubbing her hand over her wrist where her own _18_ is hiding. “Well, that’s fine, isn’t it?”

“Is it?” Simon says, turning towards his best friend for the first time since he’s made his confession. “Is it really? My soulmate’s going to be _71_ when we meet Clary. _71_. That can mean one of two things. Or, I will meet them when I’m grey and old and nearly dying. Hell, maybe I’ll meet them right as I’m letting out my last breath.”

Clary opens her mouth to interrupt, probably to tell him not to be so dramatic, but Simon barrels straight on, “ _Or_ , they’ll be my sugar daddy. Sugar mommy?” He looks at Clary with panicked eyes, “I don’t want any sugar, Clary. I just want a cute person I can take out on dates, go bowling, or to the movies. I don’t want to miss out on all the stuff you get to do when you’re young and in love. I don’t want to get only a few moment with them before they’re ripped away from me. Because no matter what, that’s what’s going to happen. _71_ , Clary. I’ll only get a few moments with my soulmate before they _die_. I don’t _want that_.”

His voice breaks on the last words, and Clary’s eyes turn from seconds away from rolling to soft and concerned. “Simon,” she says, placing a hand on his arm, “It’s going to be fine, yeah? It’s your _soulmate_. I’m sure everything will make sense when you meet them.”

“Yeah,” Simon says, blinking away the tears as he stares straight ahead again, “Let’s just go for lunch.”

\--

The first time Simon meets Raphael he’s dangling from a bridge, which doesn’t really grant him a lot of time to actually ask Raphael how old he is. He’s being kidnapped, for God’s sake. He has other things on his mind.

And then during the upcoming few hours he’s kind of really freaking out because well, he’s currently held hostage by a bunch of angry, creepy looking vampires.

(Although, if he’s really honest, Raphael’s fangs are kind of cute, in a ‘just add that to the long list of weird things Simon Lewis is attracted to’ kind of way. Honestly, he really wishes he’d never watched Twilight, that movie really screwed with his perception of vampires. He’s still kind of sad about finding out they don’t actually sparkle. Well, Raphael’s eyes kind of sparkle, in the right light. Simon thinks Raphael’s eyes tell a lot more about him then he wants. They show a lot more emotion then his face, which just seems to be stuck in a constant scowl. Which is actually kind of hot. God, Simon needs to get his shit together.)

After that there’s the ‘am I a vampire?’ freak out, the ‘holy shit I’m actually a vampire’ freak out and the whole possible downfall of the Shadow world, and both Simon’s totally nonexistent crush and the urge to ask Raphael how old he is kind of get lost in the process.

There’s a pull, though, between them. No matter how much Raphael pretends to be continuously annoyed by Simon, Simon knows he feels it too. It shows in the way constantly seems to make up excuses to keep him around, acting like ‘first advisor to the interim chapter president’ is actually a thing. Simon goes along with it, because hey, extra time he gets to spend with Raphael is extra time he gets to spend with Raphael.

He thinks they might be something, might _become_ something, something more than friends or reluctant acquaintances or whatever they are now. Simon actually starts thinking Raphael might be The One.

But then the break up happens.

Or well, it’s not really a break up, because in order for there to be a break up, they needed to have had an actual substantial relationship to begin with. Which they hadn’t. At least, not really. It still feels like a break up, though.

Simon knows he’s screwed up, he knows it. But Clary is his _best friend_ , and she’s always been there for him, and he’s always going to be there for her. The second he lays eyes on Raphael, however, walking into the room with a determined look on his face, he feels horrible.

“I’m disappointed in you,” he says, and Simon’s feeling of guilt sky rockets into another dimension. He can hear himself backtracking immediately, trying to make it right, but deep down he knows it’s too late. He screwed up. He screwed up the one thing about the Shadow world that didn’t completely suck.

The moment Raphael orders the other vampires to kill him and his friends, for a second he feels like maybe he deserves it. His reflexes make him jump back slightly, bare his teeth at Raphael, which feels like an even _worse_ betrayal, but before anything can actually really happen, Izzy busts through the wall and saves all of their asses.

(And he doesn’t miss the obvious heart eyes Clary sends her, either. He knows Izzy’s age matches the number on Clary’s wrist, too. He’s not sure they know, though. ‘At least they have time to figure it out’, he thinks bitterly, rubbing his thumb over his own 71.)

The rest of the night is a blur. The book of the white, Jace leaving, Jocelyn waking up. It’s like he’s on the outside looking in, like all of it is happening inside an aquarium and he’s just a visitor. He’s running on autopilot, the only thing stuck on his mind the look on Raphael’s face when they had disappeared into the tunnels. Disappointment, anger, _hurt_.

He doesn’t know how he makes it to a bed, only knows that the second his head hits the pillow he’s asleep, utterly exhausted from everything that happened that day. His dreams are haunted with visions of Raphael’s face.

\--

They’re stuck. No one wants to admit it, but they are. They’re stuck in their quest for finding Jace, they’re stuck on ways to get the cup back, they’re stuck on ways to defeat Valentine. They’re utterly and completely stuck, and it’s wearing all of them down.

All of them are gathered in Magnus’s lair, following up on a lead Magnus had found in The Book Of The White. A spell that might help them find Jace. It’s a shot in the dark, but at this point they’ll take anything. Clary is curled in one of Magnus’s lounge chairs, Izzy perched on the arm rest, absentmindedly running her hand through Clary’s hair. Magnus is at the table in the corner, muttering things while flipping through The Book, and Alec. Alec is pacing. Normally, Simon wouldn’t mind much, because he understand Alec’s distress of losing his parabatai, of not knowing he’s okay, but tonight it’s _really_ getting on Simon’s nerves.

So when Alec is on his fifty-third lap around the couch (Simon’s been keeping count), Simon takes him by the wrists and drags him down. Alec, the otherwise graceful and alert shadowhunter, lets himself get dragged down easily and flops down on the pillows in a heap of limbs. “Sorry,” Simon says, “Your pacing was starting to stress me out.”

“It’s fine,” Alec says, scrubbing his hands over his face. “I needed that.” With his hands like this his wrist is exposed, and Simon can clearly see the _432_ that’s printed there.

Simon doesn’t know a lot about Magnus and Alec’s story. He remembers the first time he saw the two of them together, the time they tried to save Luke. They’d stormed in with the ingredients Magnus needed, and Alec had been there, leaning in front of the couch, one arm wrapped around Magnus and his other hand clasped tightly in Magnus’s. He hadn’t put much thought in it, back then.

He remembers the wedding, Alec storming down the aisle to kiss the living daylights out of Magnus. Simon had been happy for him, but he’d felt a pang of jealousy, his hand involuntarily reaching up to touch the fabric of the suit jacket he’d borrowed from Raphael.

What happened in between that, well, Simon doesn’t really know, but he knows it can’t have been easy. And before that, too. If Simon thought 71 was bad, he can’t imagine finding the number 432 on his wrist. It makes him realize that Alec must’ve known, right from the start, that his soulmate was going to be a downworlder. “What was it like?” Simon blurts out, because his brain to mouth filter has left him to fend for himself years ago.

When Alec looks confused, Simon rambles on, “Finding that number on your wrist. So high, I mean, that can’t have been easy.” ‘How did you deal with that?’ he wants to ask, ‘Knowing your soulmate was going to outlive you? Knowing you were going to leave them behind one day?’. Simon’s been thinking about these things a lot, since he became a vampire. Sure, there’s a chance his soulmate might be immortal, but what if they aren’t? What if he meets his soulmate, and they’re a simple mortal, and Simon could pass as their grandson no matter how old he is when they meet, and he’d have to deal with eventually losing them for the rest of forever?

Alec looks uncomfortable, which Simon can understand, since it’s kind of a personal question. In lieu of explanation, he lifts up his own writs, reveals his own abnormally high number. Maybe not as abnormally high as Alec’s, but it apparently still accounts for something, because Alec relaxes and runs his thumb over the number. “I hated myself for it, at first. Thought it was my own fault. That I hadn’t been good enough, that I’d been lacking as a shadowhunter, and that this was my punishment. But then I met Magnus,” he looks up and smiles in Magnus’s direction, who appears to be working hard on the spell, but is clearly listening in to their conversation, if the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth is anything to go by. “It made sense, suddenly. I’m no longer ashamed of it. It’s a reminder that there’s someone out there that cares for me, no matter what.”

Simon smiles ruefully, “Honestly, I’d rather have a ridiculously high number like you, at least you knew for sure the person you were meant to be with had to be immortal. I could just end up with a really old mortal. 71 is such a weird middle ground.”

Alec opens his mouth to speak, probably to offer words of comfort, when Magnus interrupts them, “Ha, that’s funny,” he says, “Raphael turned 71 just a few months ago.”

\--

It makes sense. It explains the pull between them, how Simon couldn’t seem to forget about Raphael no matter how hard he tried. But still, as he’s standing in front of the Hotel Dumort, he can’t help but question it once again. What if Raphael _isn’t_ his soulmate? What if Raphael doesn’t even give him time to explain? What if Raphael doesn’t believe him, doesn’t forgive him?

Simon doesn’t knock, doesn’t announce his presence, because he knows he doesn’t have to. Raphael will know he’s here, just like Simon knows Raphael is in the building right now. He can feel his presence, though he’s not sure whether it is because of the super senses or the fact that Raphael is apparently his soulmate.

“Simon.” Raphael’s voice sounds distant, guarded, and Simon really can’t blame him. The last time they saw each other Simon had just betrayed him, and Raphael was ready to rip Simon’s throat out. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Simon, who until that point had had his back turned to Raphael finally turns around, ready to explain why he’s here, to apologize for what happened, to beg Raphael to give them a chance. Instead, the words get stuck in his throat the second he lays his eyes on Raphael. He doesn’t look any different from all the other times Simon’s seen him. The suit, the hair, the blank but guarded expression on his face. Simon, however, is seeing him in a completely different light. For the first time, Simon looks at Raphael and thinks ‘ _Soulmate_ ’, and it makes him forget about all the things he originally wanted to say to Raphael. Instead, what he blurts out is “What is your number?”

Raphael frowns, like that’s the last thing he expected Simon to say, which kind of figures. Raphael had probably expected an apology, a fight, anything but Simon asking him about the number printed on his wrist. “Simon, I don’t have time for this bullshit. Say what you came here to say and please leave. You’re lucky neither me or my clan hasn’t ripped you to shreds yet. Don’t push it.”

“Raphael, look, I know you have no reason to trust me, whatsoever. I,” Simon sighs and runs a hand through his hair, “I betrayed you, and the clan, and I’m incredibly sorry for that. I didn’t know, back then, what I would lose. I was just thinking about helping Clary out, because she’s been the only constant factor in my life since this whole shit show started. I’m really, truly sorry Raphael, but please. Just one last time, please trust me and tell me what the number on your wrist is.”

Raphael squints his eyes at him, and Simon doesn’t have the energy to do anything but stare back at him, hoping the soulmate bond he and Raphael have, a bond he knows Raphael must feel even though he might not want to admit it, is enough to pull him through, to make Raphael trust him. Eventually Raphael seems to give in, slowly peeling back the sleeve of his leather jacket to reveal a neatly printed _18_. Simon lets out a shaky breath.

“Oh,” he says, words failing him for the second time that night. Even though he was pretty sure already, even though there was no way this could’ve gone any differently, to see the prove of what he already suspected right there in front of his eyes fills him with undeniable relief. He lifts the sleeve of his own sweater vest, the threadbare fabric in stark contrast with Raphael’s leather jacket, and reveals his _71_.

Raphael is silent for a really long time. So long, even, that Simon’s actually starting to plan out escape routes for when Raphael is inevitably going to murder him. Or break his heart by telling him he must have it wrong, that they aren’t really soulmates. Simon’s not sure which one is worse. But then he notices the tears forming in the corners of Raphael’s eyes, and he freezes.

Because Raphael, who Simon is pretty sure could crush a man’s skull without blinking twice, is crying.

“Not a word,” Raphael says, furiously wiping at his eyes. He seems annoyed with himself for showing any form of emotion. Simon’s too stunned to even move, let alone say anything. “I just didn’t think I could have this. I didn’t think I could have _you_.”

Simon flounders a little, because Raphael is having _feelings_ and he doesn’t know how to _deal_ with this and oh _god_. “Yup, you have me, here I am, your soulmate!” He waves his arms around a little theatrically and Raphael huffs.

“You suck at this.”

“Yeah,” Simon says, shrugging, “I really do. But you’re just going to have to deal, because I’m you’re soulmate, and you’re stuck with me now. If you want to?” They’ve started moving closer together, and they’re close enough to touch, now. Neither of them do, though, like there’s a barrier between them that neither of them dare to cross.

“Unfortunately, I do,” Raphael says, but he sounds too fond for it to be really scathing.

“That’s cool, because I do too,” Simon replies, and suddenly they’re moving, both at the same time, and Raphael’s wrapped up in Simon’s arms, Simon’s cheek resting against the side of his head. Simon can take in the smell of Raphael’s expensive cologne now, and he realizes Raphael must be able to smell him too. God, he probably smells like Cheetos and the red bull he spilled all over his shirt earlier. He’s a mess.

Raphael, instead of pulling away and telling Simon he needs to get his shit together and maybe use a washing machine every once in a while and probably take a shower, just buries his nose in Simon’s shoulder and tightens his grip on Simon’s waist. “This isn’t going to be easy,” Simon tells Raphael’s hair, because god, their lives are a mess right now. There’s having to explain to the clan why Simon’s suddenly forgiven now, and Valentine is still out there, and Jace is still missing and the whole thing is just a goddamn mess.

“No,” Raphael says, because he’s always been a realistic person, “But it’s going to be worth it.”

And that’s all Simon needs to hear. Because, yeah, shit isn’t going to be easy, but they have forever to figure it out, literally, and in the end, it will totally be worth it.

 


End file.
